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Rambling About The Censors

Cults need enemies and when real ones are not around, they invent monsters to give the faithful something on which to focus. Orwell understood this, even though he did not use the word “cult” to describe the maniacs of his age. Where Orwell was wrong was in thinking that only apostates could become the Emmanuel Goldstein. The truth is, any bogeyman, real or imagined can fill the role.

Two media organizations are threatening to withdraw from the South by Southwest festival in Austin, Texas, next year after organizers canceled two controversial panels dealing with online harassment.

SXSW organizers this week said they would cancel the panels in response to threats of violence. In response, BuzzFeed and Vox Media said they would not participate in SXSW if the event does not find a way to address the online harassment issue.

One canceled panel centered on “Overcoming Harassment in Games” and the other was titled “SavePoint: A Discussion on the Gaming Community.”Organizers apparently feared the panels would become a flashpoint for the ongoing controversy in the video game community pitting those who say the games need to be more diverse and progressive against those who say games are being tainted by political correctness. This latter group has dubbed itself “gamergate.”

You have the usual elements. The bullshit claims that they are receiving threats followed by a move to keep contrary opinions from getting a hearing. It’s another example of how the front lash anticipates the backlash with make believe. Of course, the whole thing is coordinated so the lefty media can then pile on and claim Emmanuel Goldstein “gamergate” is the villain.

The censoring of bad-think is a singular obsession these days with the Cult. The reason is the internal logic of cults prevents them from accepting contrary opinion. They either find a way to filter it out or they find a way to stamp it out. That’s why there is a war on comment sections. It’s not that the Cult wants to suppress dissent. It’s that they want to be insulated from it.

That’s where I think people err, when it comes to examining the motivations of the Left. What drives them is a physical revulsion to facts, opinions and arguments that contradict the One True Faith. People who join mass movements do so to swap out their detested identity with that of the group. Therefore an attack on the group identity feels like a physical assault to them.

Of course, people inside a cult think it is perfectly logical and moral. It’s why Progressives have taken to dressing up like nerds and waving tables and graphs around while shouting the latest slogans. Science! has taken the place of God and the moral authority that binds their received logic with moral certainty. I have friends who can’t count their balls twice and get the same number lecturing me about the science of global warming.

To circle back to where we started, the gamergate stuff is a non-violent version of what we are seeing in Mesopotamia. ISIS shows up in a village and declares their version of Islam the default and everyone has a choice, convert or die. Progressives show up in the rough and tumble world of gamers and declare themselves the arbiter of what is and what is not diverse and progressive. Everyone else has a choice, submit or be cast out as a bully or harasser.

This tactic is being applied to social media, comment sections of news sites and anywhere else the fundamentalist Progressives see weakness. Progressive say they encourage “feedback” but it has to comport with a set of rules that makes it impossible to contradict the One True Faith. Whole swaths of reality are ruled off-limits because they are deemed “offensive” or “insensitive.”

Again, look at the choice of words. Contrary opinion is viewed as a moral assault, equal to a physical assault. Telling someone to bleep off on twitter is the same as punching someone in the nose. Both are called “bullying” as if they are the same things, because to the hive mind, they are the same thing. The One True Faith is what defines these people so anything that undermines the faith threatens their existence.

My favorite defense mechanism is when they declare contradictory opinion to be a personal attack. Telling someone, for example, that they are bad at math for thinking socialized medicine can simultaneously increase demand while lowering prices on a fixed supply is deemed a hate crime. Personal attack has now been defined as anything that makes a Progressive sad.

I think if you want to be a sunny optimist, you have to look at these little wars where the Progressives try to censor dissent. They tend to lose them and lose them ignominiously. They look like idiots trying to harass fat dorks who like playing video games where they pretend to be a macho stud getting the busty girl. They sound like shrill harpies when they rail about science fiction being too science-y.

Just as Islam is running out of gas and collapsing under the weight of its internal contradictions, this latest manifestation of Public Protestantism will collapse as well. When you’re reduced to championing a mentally ill man as woman of the year or as a feminist icon, you’re in the end phase of your movement. These attempts to stifle dissent are probably a last gasp attempt to keep the tide of reality from swamping their dingy of lunacy.

unfortunately a swamped dingy can float on the surface a long time before it finally departs to Davy Jones Locker. I’m in my mid-50s, and not so sure I will see the Cult’s flagship slip beneath the waves in my lifetime. Hell, I thought we had these mental cases defeated for good in the 80s, and like a good Halloween zombie story they came back in greater numbers and now control every lever in media, academia and government.

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3 years ago

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Busby

How did they ever put on a SXSW without Vox and Buzzfeed? In 50 years will people be wondering how anyone ever got medical care before Obama invented medicine?

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3 years ago

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james wilson

You are such an optimist, Z.

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3 years ago

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UKer

“fat dorks who like playing video games where they pretend to be a macho stud getting the busty girl.”

I object most strenuously. I am not that fat!

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3 years ago

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arcs

Dawn and a little elbow grease will do wonders on a dingy dinghy.

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3 years ago

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XVO

Hope you’re right.

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3 years ago

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JPVD

Can’t count their balls twice and get the same number. Been laughing about that line for a week.